Angel with Two Faces: Josephine Tey Series, Book 2 cover art

Angel with Two Faces: Josephine Tey Series, Book 2

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Angel with Two Faces: Josephine Tey Series, Book 2

By: Nicola Upson
Narrated by: Sandra Duncan
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Summary

Inspector Archie Penrose has invited Josephine Tey to his family home in Cornwall, a struggling but beautiful country estate on a magnificent stretch of coastline. But death clouds the holiday from the outset.

When the local theatre proves to be a stage for real-life tragedy, Archie's loyalties are divided between his friends and his job, and he and Josephine must confront the violent reality which lies beneath a seemingly idyllic community...

©2009 Nicola Upson (P)2009 WF Howes Ltd Suspense Thriller & Suspense Emotionally Gripping Scary Fiction Mystery
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I live nearby to the Penrose Estate, Gunwalloe, Porthleven. I frequently enjoy strolling through the Penrose walks as well as the beach walks by Loe Pool and beyond to Halzephron. I can completely recognise the places described so perfectly in this intriguing story, set in the 1930s. They are the marvellous backdrop to the fictional characters as
is the section involving the Minack Theatre at Porthcurnow. The narrator reads this unabridged book wonderfully with all the voices true and identifiable individually. There is a series of these Josephine Tey detective stories and this is the second. References are alluded to which would enrich enjoyment further if you knew them so I recommend the collection as a whole as well
as this delightful choice.

Rich and many stranded story with superb narration

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I really like the characters Archie and Josephine and I thought this was an enjoyable read by the end. However, at times I found the piling up of harrowing events all a bit much - page after page of misery and really awful images. The strength of the characterisation wins through though and I thought it was a good mystery with a good Cornish setting.

Enjoyable overall

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..and the sunday-supplement therapy-speak mouthed by almost everybody in the story. I can take the odd misplaced 'okay' or shades of obviously 21st century attitudes but it was really hard to listen to Philip Roth length expositions filled with a complexity of language and, what I suppose you could call psychological insights, that would not be available to a minimally educated person in the inter-war period. (They were nearly as eloquent as the definitely uneducated main character in 'the Nature of Monsters' whose narrative voice was so jarring I couldn't get through the book.) I had to fast-forward the long conversation between Morwenna and Penrose as it was as ridiculous as it was melodramatic. (I won't give details as it would spoil the story - suffice to say it was like listening to a erudite though glib self-help book for women in self-destructive relationship. Or should that be co-dependent relationships? There's also a very obvious dichotomy between the predisposition towards 'understanding' and the secret-squirrel behaviour endemic in the 'community'. I found it hard to like most of the characters or even care about their fates. I certainly has no empathy with the besotted duo at the centre of the story. They were as selfish and sleazy a pair as any you'd see on a daytime chat-and-fight show today - and not for the obvious reason that will become evident if you listen to the book. On the plus side, I like the Josephine Tey character though I often wished she'd let rip at Morwenna and the other M - the witchy one who seems to do the thinking for everybody in the village. Also, the reader was excellent. She seemed to me to manage all the accents, though I'm sure that there will be people who disagree, and even pulled off the male voices without sounding like a pantomine prince charming.

Solid whodunnit ruined by anachronisms..

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I’m not going to give spoilers but at one point I did wonder if the only one of the characters wasn’t having sex with was his bloody horse. It started to feel like the author was taking the piss although maybe this was just an homage to Du Maurier with all the muttering and dark whispering about outsiders, I don’t know, I don’t have an English degree. A thoroughly rum bunch but not nearly enough of the wonderful bitchy costume designers in this one.

A shedload and a half of plot.

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beautifully acted out by the reader, this story keeps dishing out surprises till the very end. A real joy.

this story just keeps giving!

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